Eric A Longenhagen: Howdy, everyone. I’ve gotta record Effectively Wild a little later so once again I’m holding tight to the hour (book release week and all that), so let’s get right to it.

Greg: What’s your plan with J2 rankings? Any plan to delay it since the signing deadline could be pushed back?

Eric A Longenhagen: It’s low on the priority list right now. I imagine the top of the class which is currently already on The Board will change very little, if at all, with an update. Update will be more about adding names.

J: Daniel Cabrera seems to be dropping pretty rapidly on a lot of boards. Is it because the underlying batted ball data on him isn’t great, and the threshold to provide offensive value in an OF corner is so high?

Eric A Longenhagen: I’d guess the latter but I’s add that this class is just very good and he may have been passed while his profile remains the same. I think that question is better suited for someone who has moved him down, though. I like him the same as ever.

J: How do you evaluate someone like Landon Knack who has a very atypical dev path (only been a full time pitcher for two years, questionable frame), but seems to have made an adjustment to his posture (leaned back) that has led to an uptick in velo and results as a senior? Anecdotally he seems like a guy who could have weirdo upside, but the profile might not scream it initially.

Toshi: Hi, thank you for chat. If the MLB season ends well into November, I am wondering if these games late in season need to be played in ballparks with roofs. How many ballparks have roofs?

Meg Rowley: Including the Rangers’ new digs, by my count there are eight ballparks with roofs, either retractable or fixed.

Meg Rowley: One of those is the Rogers Centre, and I suppose we don’t know what international travel might look like come November, and some of the others are in places that will be mighty chilly, but even still, with the parks in warmer parts of the country, there should be plenty of places for playoff games to be played when the time comes.

Jinder: Let’s pretend all of the covid stuff hasn’t happened, for a moment, which of these pitchers did you expect to have the best 2020: Darvish, Kluber, Lynn, or Paxton (pre-injury)?

Meg Rowley: Darvish – the way he was coming on late last season was pretty impressive.

Meg Rowley: I just bake in time lost to some sad, funky bit of nonsense for Paxton at this point.

Eric A Longenhagen: hey hey hey, everyone… give me like 30 seconds

Eric A Longenhagen: okay, chat

Eric A Longenhagen: let’s do it

CL: What is the contingency plan for MiLB? Say MLB plays in spring training complexes, would MiLB play on the back fields?

Eric A Longenhagen: I haven’t read nightengale’s piece yet. I think we might see teams have a minor league roster and a half, maybe a roster or two, playing backfield games. You’d ideally have a way to keep reserves sharp in case of injury and I’d bet every team has prospects who aren’t part of that consideration who they’d still like to get reps.

Eric A Longenhagen: But I don’t know for sure, that’s speculation. We’re probably a while away from that being decided and I’d guess it’s more likely we see some kind of widespread minor league play in the fall

David Roberge is: Fat

Dan Szymborski: Dan is too! We can have a club.

Domingo: Are Evan Longoria and Kris Bryant the same person?

Domingo: Longoria and Bryant: well rounded third basemen, peaked early, face of franchise, similar stats when you compare age.

Dan Szymborski: Eh, I’m nto sure they’re hte same.

Dan Szymborski: Longoria had more glove

Jay Jaffe: Hello folks, and welcome to another more-or-less shelter-in-place-based edition of my weekly chats. I hope you all are managing out there amid this challenging time. I’m doing all right — better some days than others — while New York is in the epicenter of the US outbreak. My family and I are safe and well-stocked in terms of supplies, going outside to a minimum and while complying with social-distancing mandates as we deal with the needs of our daughter and our dog, and we’re now regularly wearing fabric masks when we go out.

Jay Jaffe: I just filed a piece on the wild career of Evan Gattis, who’s been in the news a lot lately, for better or worse. That should be published sometime during this chat.

Edit: It’s here https://blogs.fangraphs.com/evan-gattis-rollercoaster-ride-through-baseball-has-ended/

Brandonbart: Hey Jay! Thank you for continuing to do these! Just out of curiosity, do you know if all the spring training sites are ‘wired’ for MLB.TV should the season go in that direction?

Jay Jaffe: I think they’re all fine as far as TV and streaming. The question — beyond the obvious one about whether some variant of the plan that was reported by The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal on Friday night (https://theathletic.com/1723090/2020/04/03/rosenthal-mlb-pondering-gam…) is even feasible — is whether they’re fully wired for Statcast, which is moving to a new technology called Hawk-Eye this year. I imagine that if this comes to pass, they will be.

Billy: Rather than a home run derby, let’s have a fastest pitch competition…seems just as arbitrary

Jay Jaffe: If there’s a skills competition for hitters, you’d figure there might be a parallel one for pitchers, but airing it all out in such a context poses a much higher injury risk than a home run derby would, so I’d be very skeptical that comes to pass.

Eric A Longenhagen: Howdy, friends. Let’s do our baseball chat.

Earl: If there is a 2020 draft in the current modified form, do you think it’ll be more beneficial or less than the typical draft for a team like the Giants who have multiple high picks? With talent pool that’ll be available, other teams’ strategies.

Eric A Longenhagen: Uhhhhh, I suppose I don’t truly know but my knee jerk reaction is that it’s bad for creativity (like there’s no way to execute what the Braves did last year, for instance) and teams picking a bunch in the comp rounds are the ones best positioned to be creative in a typical year, so those are the teams most punished by the inability to get creative.

B: What range might Jesse Franklin go in? He seems to have that ideal spine angle (ie bent close to 40°) that is conducive to a steep plane/attack angle. That sort of mechanical profile coupled w/ the possibility that he sticks at a premium position makes him seem like one of the more interesting “sleeper” college bats IMO.

Eric A Longenhagen: I like Franklin. He’s relatively positionless but I agree he rakes. Does that guy get a medical redshirt in addition to his extra COVID year of eligibility? And does he use those multiple years of leverage as a reason to return to school for another year?

More Quarantine Please!: I’ve noticed that a popular type of question in Fangraphs’ chats is the best way to get a job in baseball. I thought people might like to know that Tim Dierkes of MLB Trade Rumors has a good article up today with feedback from multiple actual MLB execs: